Petrov handed five-place grid penalty

Unsurprisingly Renault driver Vitaly Petrov has been handed a five-place grid penalty for the Indian Grand Prix at the end of the month.

Petrov had been battling the Ferrari of Fernando Alonso down into turn 3 and with Petrov in the slipstream of Alonso, both drivers seemed to be completely unaware of anyone else on the track as the two remained engrossed in their own battle.

Both drivers approached the corner too fast and while Alonso was able to sneak past onto the run off area on the outside of the corner, Petrov slammed into the back of Mercedes driver Michael Schumacher.

Schumacher was forced to retire with severe damage to the rear of the car, while Petrov also retired following the incident.

With the incident under investigation after the race, the stewards in Korea decided to award the Renault driver a five-place grid penalty, plus a reprimand.

The reprimand system was introduced at the Korean Grand Prix last weekend and will act as a further deterrent towards drivers who continually offend and receive punishments from the race stewards.

This will enable those drivers to be handed further sanctions for repeat offences and will be jokingly known on VF1 as the ‘Lewis Hamilton rule’.